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Wine Experiences, From Canadian Riesling to Cult Californian and Beyond
Delaying, delaying, delaying. I have so many experiences and moments to share – and literally, the whole of September had been a dread. This September will have the least number of posts since I started to regularly write this blog. Oh well. It’s been a busy month, at work and outside, so hopefully October will be more fruitful in terms of wine (and life) writing.
Let me just sum up some of my recent experiences. One of the very first things I want to mention is a substantial advance in the “grape count” – adding 11 new grapes (reaching a total of 351) – well, yes, some of them clones. The Clonal Project Riesling from Cattail Creek winery in Canada brings in 4 different Riesling clones. It was also possible to taste those clones individually, but at about $100 for the set, it was an expensive proposition. However, this Clonal Riesling, a blend of four clones was outright delicious, with a great harmony of fruit, earthiness and acidity – it was a great wine. Here is the list of all the new grapes:
Riesling Clone 239, Riesling Clone 49, Riesling Clone 21 Young Vines, Riesling Clone 21 Old Vines – 2009 Riesling Clonal Blend, VQA Four Mile Creek, Canada
Zibibbo – Donnafugata Ben Rye, Passito di Pantelleria DOC
Pignolo – 2007 Bastianich Callabrone Rosso, Friuli DOC
Schioppettino – 2007 Bastianich Callabrone Rosso, Friuli DOC
Vranac – Rubin Vranac, Serbia
Mavrotragano – 2006 Atlantis Red, Santorini, Greece
Carignan Blanc – 2009 Pico’VDP de l’Herault Blanc
Trepat Blanc – 2007 Blanc de Montsalvat, Priorat DOC
Have to honestly tell you that all these wines were very good, each having it’s own personality and very pleasant to drink. I’m also very glad to add Pignolo and Schioppettino grapes, as those two are part of the main table in the Wine Century club application – may be one day it will be complete!
During September I was lucky enough to attend two trade wine tastings. One word to describe the experience is – “overwhelming”. I can’t do a fair representation of all the great wines we tried – Paul Hobbs, Shafer Hillside, Honig, Evening Land, Bussia Barolo, Archery Summit, Blankiet Estate, Palmaz, … – the list can go on and on (just to give you an idea, there were about 1400 wines in the first tasting, and about 700 wines in the second – of course nobody tried all those wines, but you understand the size). Here are some of the highlights, in pictures:
Paul Hobbs wines:
Evening Land Pinot Noirs from Oregon – amazing:
Shafer Hillside:
2001 Masi Mazzano Amarone – this is what Amarone should taste like – absolutely amazing, my personal favorite in tasting:
To complete the updates, I started new series of blog posts at The Art Of Life Magazine – the series dedicated to spirits, and first two posts in the series are talking about Brandy and Scotch.
That’s all for now, folks. Have to go – talk to you later. Cheers!
Daily Glass: Domaine Breton Bourgueil, A Vinous Vino
Do you know how old tavern smells? The one were thousands of wine bottles were opened, and wooden tables soaked up all the spills and drops of the wine during many tens or may be even hundreds of years? I don’t know about you, but for me this smell means “hello, vino was here!”. This is what you get when you pour this 2007 Epaule Jete Catherine and Pierre Breton Bourguiel in the glass. You get the most vinous nose you can imagine – not a hint of sweetness, not a hint of berries – only a noble smell of the ageless wine with the whiff of acidity. On the palate you get earthiness, minerality and more acidity, all delicately balanced by the early sour cherry kind of fruit.
Once I tasted this wine, one of the first thoughts was – it reminds me of a recent experience. It was so light and transparent (noted after tasting: 12% alcohol) that it brought back memories of the natural and biodynamic wine tasting at the PJ Wine (here is the link to that post). Similar to the wines in that tasting, this Cabernet Franc wine also let the Terroir to shine through, unadulterated. After checking the web site for Domain Breton – voila, it appears that this wine is also natural, organic and biodynamic!
All in all this was a great experience – I’m not sure it will be easy to repeat, as it was the only bottle I had (I got it in Lavinia wine store in Geneva). Oh well – this wine is worth seeking and experiencing, so talk to your favorite wine store guy – I will certainly talk to mine. Cheers!
Will This Wine Age?
Yes, it is no secret that I prefer to drink wines which have some age on them – we even discussed this in one of the recent posts. What happens when the wine ages? In one simple word, it evolves. Its taste changes – for the better. It gets to the different level of complexity – and delivers more pleasure. Sometimes, it even brings an element of awe with it – when you are drinking wine which is 30, 50 or may be even hundred years old, and it still tastes great (try to keep some food to taste good for a couple of decades – let me know if you will succeed), it is an amazing experience.
Now, if you want to drink aged wines, you got two choices. You can buy wines which are already aged (Benchmark Wine Company is one of the great sources of aged wines). It is not easy to find what you want, and aged wines are usually expensive. Another option is to buy the wine, and keep it in your cellar until it reaches the optimum drinking age. When using second option, the trick is to know when the perfect age is, right? There are few ways to go about it. The classic “collectors” way is to buy a case ( at least), and then open a bottle from time to time and see (err, taste) what is going on. This is a good way to go, but it requires storage space and money.
Then you can rely on the advice of the wine critics – when you look at wine review in Wine Spectator or Wine Advocate, very often you will see a recommended time range when the wine will be at its best. This should work, but might be a bit boring. What else? You can play with your wine. What I mean is that you can conduct a little experiment and learn with a good probability how well your wine will age. In order to do this, you will need only a minimal set of tools (one tool, to be precise), a little air, a bottle of wine and a few days of time.
As far as tool is concerned, I don’t mean any of those fancy $200 silver, magnetic and whatever else concoctions which promise to magically manipulate characteristics of wine and make it age in no time. So the tool which you will need is called a vacuum pump, like the one you can see below (this one is made by the company called VacuVin):
One of the most important components in the wine aging is oxygen. Oxygen, which makes its way in a miniscule quantity through the cork into the wine bottle, makes wine to change, to age. As soon as the bottle of wine is opened, the process of aging is started. This is why when you open a bottle of a young wine, you need to give it a little time to “breathe”, to open up, to absorb the air and subsequently, to evolve. Now, the idea is simple. You open the bottle, pour a glass, then you close a bottle with the rubber stopper and pump the air out, and put the bottle aside (no need for special storage conditions). You repeat this process the next day, then the next day and may be even the next day again! There is no science here (or may be there is one, but at least I don’t know the formula), but I think every additional day the wine drinks well means about 5 -8 years of the normal aging. Therefore, if the wine will be improving for the 4 days in the row, you can expect that it will reach its peak in 20-30 years.
Want an example? The bottle of 2007 Chappellet Pritchard Hill Napa Valley Cabernet Franc made it into my house. On the first day, the wine was not showing much except tremendous density and the color, which was more black than red. The second day didn’t show much change. On the day 3, some of the black fruit started coming out, with some spices and tiniest hint of green peppers (can be my imagination too). And then finally, on the day four, the fruit became easily noticeable, together with good acidity and nice balanced tannins. The wine was almost drinkable… but too late, as the bottle was gone at that point. I think one more day would make it amazing – but I can only hope to find out that at some point in the future.
Don’t be afraid to play with your wine – after all, it is only another kind of food, right? Ooops, this might not sound too well. Anyway, experiment – and uncover new amazing taste. And remember that little age is always good (you just need to define “little” ). Cheers!
Celebrate Two Noble Grapes in One Day – What Are You Drinking Tonight? #CabernetDay and #TempranilloDay
I’m honestly puzzled, but somehow September 1st had being declared an international #CabernetDay and #TempranilloDay – it feels like there are not enough days in the calendar to properly celebrate all the grapes? Anyway, it is what it is, right? And the celebration is on, which means … oh boy… you have a reason to have a glass (or two or …) of wine tonight!
To celebrate Cabernet Day, all you need to do is to open a bottle of your favorite (or better yet, the one you never had) Cabernet Sauvignon or Cabernet Franc wine (and of course Cabernet blend will do quite well too), and then tell the world how great it was (if you will only tell your neighbor, that will also count). With abundance of choices from Bordeaux, California, New York, Washington, Australia, Canada, Italy, Argentina, Chile, Spain, Israel and pretty much everywhere else, you will have no problems finding a good bottle of Cabernet to enjoy. And instead of giving you any particular recommendations, I would like to simply reflect on some of the past experiences:
Next, we definitely should acknowledge Tempranillo, a noble grape of Spain. While this grape is slowly trickling into other winemaking regions, it is a true star in Spain, where it shines in Rioja and Ribero del Duero regions, making some of the most beautiful (and age-worthy) wines in the world. You can also find it producing good results in Portugal, however, under the names of Aragonez and Tinta Roriz. Again, no particular recommendations as to what wine to open, just some reflections here for you:
Whatever bottle you will end up opening, the routine is not new – all you need to do is to enjoy it. And if you will be kind enough to leave a comment here, I will be glad to enjoy it together with you. Cheers!
Experiencing Wines of Canada
Coming back to the memories of “ahh-so-distant-by-now” our Canada vacation (it’s been almost a month!), I need to share my wine experiences with you. You might remember two earlier posts (you can find them here and here), which I prefer to refer to as “picture reports”, which gave you the visual expression of the food and some of the wines in Canada. However, we had an opportunity to spend some time in one of the Canadian wine countries, surrounding the small town of Niagara-on-the-Lake – and it was an eye-opening experience for me.
Until this trip, my idea of Canadian wines was very simple – Icewine. I knew for a while that Canada makes some really famous Icewines, which compete with German and Austrian Icewines. Outside of Icewine, my only reference were wines of the Finger Lakes region in upstate New York (general direction of Canada). While I wouldn’t claim that I visited a mass amount of wineries in Finger Lakes, in a few places we visited the only drinkable wines were Rieslings, and all the red wines were plain bad. Therefore, these were my expectations for Canadian wines.
I decided to start from the winery with the name at least I heard of – Inniskillin, and of course, the only wine I knew “of fame” there was an Icewine. As a side note, I want to mention that the winery had a playroom for kids – which is a very important factor in letting adults enjoy wine tasting, even during family vacation. The first wine we tried was 2010 Two Vineyard Riesling – very clean, good tropical fruit expression, all paired with beautiful acidity, a nice finish. This was a great start of the tasting. The next wine completely blew me away – the 2009 Legacy Series Pinot Gris. First, I didn’t expect Pinot Gris to be produced in Canada. But is not the main factor. Very complex, with explicit minerality and spicy bouquet on the palate, this wine still puts a smile on my face when I think about it.
After having a great start with the whites, my level of expectations increased for the reds – and rightfully so. 2009 Montague Estate Vineyard Pinot Noir was very nice, varietally correct with a precise expression of smokiness and red fruit. Again, I would never expect to find a Pinot Noir of such clarity at a winery located so high up North – but I did. 2009 Shiraz Cabernet had perfect acidity, good minerality, just the right balance of dark fruit. 2009 Cabernet Franc was simply my favorite red wine – perfect, very balanced, with clearly expressed green peppers and explicit minerality (you might think that I’m abusing the term – but minerality was one of the key characteristics of all the Inniskillin wines we tasted, so I can’t help myself but to call it out).
As you might expect, sweet wines were next. We are not talking about some arbitrary late harvest wines – we are talking about Icewines, which have the highest sugar concentration out of all sweet wines, as the grapes are ripening on the vines until the frost reaches –8°C (about 17F) – then the grapes are harvested while being frozen and pressed right away – which yields a tiny amount of super-concentrated grape juice – this is why the wines are called Icewine (also such a low yield explains the high price of the Icewines). First, we tried the 2010 Sparkling Vidal Icewine, which was very light and delicate. 2007 Cabernet Franc Icewine was a real star though. I have to mention that Inniskillin was the first winery to produce Icewine from the red grape. Also, Inniskillin worked together with Riedel, the leading wine glass maker in the world, to produce a specially shaped Icewine glass that enhances the aromatics of the Icewine.
Going back to Cabernet France Icewine, it was incredible, one of the best ever dessert wines I ever tried. Why am I saying that? Balance. Ultimate Balance was the first and foremost characteristic of this wine. Beautiful balance, perfect lingering acidity, and literally unnoticeable sweetness – great wine. All in all, it was an outstanding lineup of wines at Inniskillin, I can’t recommend highly enough each and every wine I tried.
Next stop we made at the Cattail Creek Family Estate winery. One of the reasons to pick that particular winery was the fact that they have a few wines with the grapes I didn’t have before, like Chardonnay Musque, or different Riesling clones. I’m glad we stopped by, as we found more great tasting wines, plus most of the wines are made in very small quantities, so many are available only at the winery itself. First, we tried 2008 Catastrophe White, which was perfectly refreshing, with good acidity and a good amount of white fruit. Then we tried 2009 Catastrophe Red, which had very good balance, nice red and black fruit expression, soft and pleasant. It is interesting to note that Catastrophe wine series labels depict real cats who lived at the winery. Last but not least was the 2009 Chardonnay Musque – very nice, with good acidity, good reflection of what Chardonnay is, good subtle tropical fruit expression, more as a hint. This was yet another great experience.
Our last stop was Chateau des Charmes. This winery had the most impressive building of all:
The wines here were also very impressive. We started with 2007 ‘Old Vines’ Riesling (I wanted to experience “old vines” Riesling) – and to my complete surprise, this Riesling had a Petrol nose! I was always under the impression that Petrol nose is a property of only German Rieslings – and here we go, Riesling from Canada with full classic German Riesling expression. In addition to the Petrol nose, it also had very good fruit, medium body and perfect balancing acidity. Next were more of the very impressive Pinot Noirs. 2007 Pinot Noir had a beautiful nose, and lots of tannins on the palate – it was unusually muscular for the Pinot Noir, probably in need of a few years to open up, but still, it was very good. 2007 ‘Old Vines’ Pinot Noir was also very big and powerful, with a clean smoky nose, but also needing time as the previous wine.
Last but not least was 2008 Gamay Noir ‘Droit’, which happened to be a clone of Gamay and therefore it accounted for an additional grape for my “counting grapes” project. This wine had a very unusual herbaceous nose, and was nice and light on the palate – definitely a food-friendly wine.
That concludes the Canadian wine story, as we didn’t have time to visit more places. But even based on this experience, if before I knew of only Icewines from Canada, now all the Canadian wines are squarely on the “to find and drink” list for me – and I highly recommend that you will make an effort to find them and try them as well. The challenge is – I didn’t see that many Canadian wines on the shelves of the wine stores here in Connecticut. Oh well, hopefully, we can change that. Cheers!
Daily Glass: 2009 Irony Pinot Noir
I guess partially encouraged by all the #pinotsmackdown conversations on Twitter, I decided to open Pinot Noir tonight. The bottle I opened was 2009 Irony Pinot Noir, Russian River Valley.
My luck with California Pinot Noir varies widely (I think I can count more misses than hits, I just typically don’t write about those). To my delight, this wine was a hit. After a few moments of breathing, it came out very smooth and mellow, with beautiful smoky nose (one of my favorite properties of a good Pinot). Balanced fruit on the palate, lots of strawberries, some violets, good acidity and soft tannins. Very long finish. I will put Drinkability at 8-.
Next week, on September 1st, we will be celebrating Cabernet Day (#CabernetDay, for more information and rules of participation you can click here) – make sure to celebrate with all the wine lovers by opening that special bottle you’ve being saving for so long. Also, considering that there are more than 600 grapes used in winemaking, and only 365 days in a year, I’m sure we can make every day a special grape day. Cheers!
Food Network, Coming To The Bottle Near You
Yesterday I found out that Food Network is not about only food anymore. Of course wine always was present in various Food Network shows, but only as a cooking ingredient. Now Food Network teamed up with Wente Vineyards to make your in-home entertainment easier by bringing you food friendly wines, which will also fit any budget (all wines are priced at $10.99 at Cost Less Wines and Liquors).
I’m ashamed to admit that I never heard about Wente Vineyards before, and it appears that they are the oldest continuously operated family-owned winery ( they’ve in business for more than 128 years) located close to San Francisco in Livermore Valley. It is interesting to note that Wente Vineyards has Certified Sustainable designation, which means that that they are using sustainable methods to produce their wines ( which is good for us, consumers).
So far there are 4 different wines in the Entwine series, two whites and two reds – Pinot Grigio, Chardonnay, Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon.
The idea behind the Entwines is simple – food and wine are meant to be consumed together, and Food Network wants to help you to make the pairing effortless and enjoyable. On the Entwines dedicated web site you can find 
recipes and food/wine pairing suggestions. Useful pairing information is also available on the back label of each and every bottle.
So what about wines themselves? I had an opportunity to try all four wines yesterday. They are all nice, easy to drink and should pair well with food – but may be they are too easy to drink for my taste. When I drink wine, I’m looking for the experience, and one of main questions which I’m trying to answer for myself is whether or not I would want to experience that wine again. While it might be interesting to try the Entwines with food, these are not the wines I would have a desire to experience again. At the same time, if you need to entertain a group of people, these wines will do just fine, exactly because of their simplicity (don’t forget also that they are inexpensive). In terms of Drinkability, I would rate them all at 7-, except Chardonnay which had more substance to it, so I will give it a 7.
You should try it for yourself – I’m sure these wines will be widely available. As for the Food Network and wines, I think they can kick it up a notch, by introducing a Wine Program. And guess what – I would be delighted to host it. Yep. We can all dream – let’s drink to that. Cheers!
Wine, Aged Beautifully
Let’s talk about aging. No, that’s not what you think – not people aging and not the world problems with the aging populations. Let’s talk about the aging of the wine. By the way, it appears that second time in the row I’m taking upon the popular subject – in the previous post we were comparing the wine glasses (post can be found here), and now the wine aging.
With all due respect (based on this phrase, my friend Kfir would tell you right away that I’m about to blast something), I completely disagree with the majority of the popular opinion on the subject of wine aging. Open a wine book, read a wine blog, or ask a question on Quora, and for the most part, you will get an answer that 95% of the wines are not supposed to be aged and should be consumed within a year or two from the release date.
Based on my personal experience, I disagree with this viewpoint. I can’t put a percentage or a quantity on it, but I believe that well in excess of half of the wines produced in the world (not by the volume, but by the variety of the actual wines) can age very well for 5 to 10 years – and “age well” means “to improve with age”. My biggest problem with the aging of the wines is … space. If you want to drink aged wine, you either need a lot of space, or you need [typically] lots of money, as most of the aged wines increase in price. If you have a cool and dark area with constant humidity, you can buy wines as they are released. store them and enjoy them later as they evolve and mature. Otherwise, you need to have money and a reputable source of the aged wines (improper storage conditions will ruin any wine in no time). Once you solved your space problem, the rest is easy.
How easy is that? How can we know if that bottle of wine will age well – read: improve with age? There are way too many factors affecting the aging of the wine, and being able to predict age-worthiness of the wine (age-worthiness means that wine will evolve and taste better in the future) is more art than science. As an example, Matt Kramer, one of my favorite wine writers identifies age-worthy wines using characteristic of the mouth-feel, a mid-palate weight of the wine in the mouth. Here is my take on the subject. First, yes, of course, some of the wines are meant to be aged – for instance, Beaujolais Noveau is released in November and should be consumed by May of next year. Outside of the wines which are designated by winemakers as “do not age”, the majority has some aging potential. I believe the biggest dependency here is on the winemaker and what she or he wants to achieve with particular wine – if wine is well made, there is a good chance that it will also age well.
Some wines are helped by their “DNA” – under which I mean from what grape and where in the world the wine is made (of course good/bad year matters too). California Cabernet Sauvignon expected to [typically] reach maturity at around 13 years. Bordeaux easily ages for 30-50 years. Syrah-based wines, whether from Australia or France, can live for 50 years. Many 50-years old Riojas are fresh and vibrant as being just made. But “DNA” alone is not enough – wine should be well made in order to age well.
If you are still reading this post, I guess you might be tired by now by this prolonged escapade into the wine aging, and you might be wondering why, why is all that wine aging might be important? Well, I can’t answer this question. At least not before you will find the wine with a little age on it, which will blow you away. Yes, it is an acquired taste. But once you will actually acquire that “mature wine” taste, this is what you are going to crave, I guarantee you.
Let me share some recent and exciting discoveries. Let’s start with 1995 Flora Springs Chardonnay Napa Valley. This wine is made out of 100% Chardonnay. While the nose was not very expressive, the level of complexity of this wine is unimaginable. Yes, considering dark golden color, this wine might well be past prime, and without that “acquired taste” for the aged white wine, you might be even upset after the first sip. This wine was exhibiting notes of vanilla which almost moved up to some sort of the almond paste, still showing some acidity. Next are savory notes, almost to the level of saltiness, which was increasing the complexity even further. The wine was in a very stable shape as it tasted the same on the second day as well. Will this wine evolve further? Who knows – but I would be very happy to taste this wine again in five or maybe ten years. Drinkability: 8
The next wine is 1992 Domaine de Thalabert Crozes-Hermitage from France. Crozes-Hermitage wines are made primarily out of Syrah, typically with a very small addition of Marsanne and Rousanne grapes. As we mentioned before, Syrah wines age quite well, and this was an excellent example of the well-aged Syrah wine. This wine was very playful and soft, with lots of red fruit on the nose and on the palate, very good acidity and a good level of tannins. This wine probably will continue evolving for the next five to ten years, and again I will be glad to help you share the bottle later on – if you will have one. Drinkability: 8-
Going back to California, 2001 Lolonis Petite Sirah Redwood Valley. In short – outstanding. This 10 years old wine was completely fresh and beautiful. It is made from organically grown Petite Sirah grape. The wine showed perfect dark fruit, good acidity, full body, excellent tannins, and perfect overall balance. This wine might be evolving for the next 10-20 years – again, the trick will be to find it.
Drinkability: 8+.
Last, but not least, 1991 Justin Cabernet Franc, San Luis Obispo County. This was the “wow” wine, that exact mind-blowing one. First, while I like Cabernet Franc wines, I had no idea they can age so well. I can literally guarantee that in the blind tasting format, very very few people would be able to guess the age of this wine. Deep garnet color, not a hint of age (no brownish overtones at all). Perfect fresh fruit, soft and luscious, a perfect balance of tannins and acidity. This wine was the oldest in the tasting, and it was definitely the best of tasting. Considering how good it was now, I can’t even guess how much time it has left – but I would be very glad to find a few more bottles to be “wowed” again in the future. Drinkability: 9-
One note before we conclude – this was a rare case of someone doing all the hard work, and me enjoying the results – I got all wines from Benchmark Wine Company and each one of them had been less than $20.
Don’t know if you got the desire to seek well-aged wines – I hope you will one day. For now, I can only wish upon myself, my family, all my friends and all of you, my readers, to age as beautifully as this Justin Cabernet Franc does. Cheers!
Daily Glass: Martinet Menut
Looking for the bottle to open (this is not ready, not tonight, don’t feel like it,…) I stumbled upon a bottle with the bird picture on the label. Okay, I have no idea how this might taste, never tried that before, don’t know what grape(s) it is made out of – yes, that looks like the right bottle to open.
Cork popped out, and the wine goes in the glass. Energetic swirl (exactly as taught by Kevin Zraly, without covering glass with the hand), sniff and… I couldn’t extort anything beyond sacramental “WOW”… It was a true sensory sensation – the wine had perfect vinous nose, with absolutely everything you want to find in glass of red wine – the fruit, the vineyard, spices, earth, terroir, mystery…
On the palate, it had lots of dark red fruit – plums and cherries, all coupled with good acidity and tannins. Of course, after being blown away so much, I had to check what is it I am actually drinking. This 2007 Martinet Menut is a red wine blend from Priorat region in Spain. I have to tell you – even today, in the age of Internet, there are still plenty of things which are difficult to find. Finding information about this Martinet Menut wine, as well as producer ( supposedly, Clos Martinet, one of the “cult” Priorat wineries) was very challenging. The wine apparently is Grenache-based blend, but this is about all information I’m sure at, so let’s leave it like this. This 2007 Martinet Menut can actually be compared with Clos Mogador I tasted at the Spanish Wine Festival (you can find post here) – definitely in the amount of pleasure one can get from a glass of wine. Drinkability: 8.
You think I got too excited? Always possible, so you’ll be the judge. Get the bottle, and lets compare the notes. Cheers!
Sauvignon Blanc For Sauvignon Blanc Day #SauvBlanc
Turns out that yesterday was an [International] Sauvignon Blanc Day, as I learned from the post on Bottle Notes. I wouldn’t call this quite “International” yet – it was originated in 2009 by St. Supéry winery in California, to celebrate one of the main wine-making grapes in the world, Sauvignon Blanc. While St. Supéry run the whole program of seminars and tastings on June 24th, all dedicated to Sauvignon Blanc, this was also a social media event which anyone could join in using Twitter or any other social media outlets.
Sauvignon Blanc is a white grape used in many regions throughout the world. With all due respect to California, I would like to first mention Loire Valley in France, which brings us Sancerre and Pouilly-Fumé wines. French Sauvignon Blanc wines typically very dry, with pronounced herbaceous flavors and expressive minerality. The same Sauvignon Blanc grape takes on totally different expression in New Zealand and Chile – very bright, zinging acidity, lots of fresh citrus flavors and some hint of fresh cut grass. Then comes California with yet another take on the popular grape – California Sauvignon Blanc typically much fuller bodied than their counterparts from France or New Zealand, much fruitier and with lesser acidity.
I talked about Sauvignon Blanc wines already a few times on this blog (you can find those posts here and here). This time, I want to talk about some special (and totally unexpected) experience with California Sauvignon Blanc. In general, Sauvignon Blanc wines are not expected to age. They are typically consumed young, may be within 3-4 years of age. When we opened a bottle of 2000 Flora Springs Soliloquy from Napa Valley, a Sauvignon Blanc wine, we didn’t have much [good] expectations – it was more of an experiment – hey, let’s see if this is even drinkable. To our complete surprise, this wine was perfect! Yes, it showed signs of maturity, definitely in the dense dark yellow color of aged white wine, but otherwise, it was fresh, complex, with lots of white fruit and hint of earthiness on the palate, good acidity. 2009 Soliloquy was one of my favorite wines of last year, it was number 9 in my 2010 Top Dozen list, but still I didn’t expect that 11 years old Sauvignon Blanc will taste so good. Drinkability: 8+.
Sauvignon Blanc is perfect summer wine. You really don’t need to wait for 11 years to enjoy it – and even that we are already past Sauvignon Blanc Day, go get a bottle today and toast summer day and great discoveries. Cheers!
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